In my recent post about challenges and opportunities in my reading, I announced that I would take a short break from reading Star Wars after my coverage of Episode I, so I could try something else for a bit. This would break up the monotony of Star Wars coverage and permit me to read something non-Star Wars in the next few years. I opted to begin with some books about spies, war, and political intrigue: the original James Bond novels from Ian Fleming and some Tom Clancy novels.
I've enjoyed James Bond movies since I was a child. My parents took me to see the Pierce Brosnan movies in theatres, and we would watch the Roger Moore and Timothy Dalton ones on TV whenever they would come on. I didn't understand much about the world of spies then, but as an adult I've come to know a bit more about the time period, as well as the tropes of such stories.
I first read Tom Clancy novels in high school, starting with Rainbow Six, because I had begun playing the video game of the same name. As a young man I read a few of his other works, but badly out of order. A few years ago, I tried again reading them in a row, and did his first two Jack Ryan-focussed stories (The Hunt for Red October and Patriot Games), but got distracted by other books and never went back to it.
I'd like to try reading all of the old Ian Fleming Bond novels, as well as a handful of other more recent stories (the current comics, and a Jeffrey Deaver novel from a few years ago). I'd also like to try reading all of Tom Clancy's body of work, with the exception of the series he co-created but did not write (like Op-Center and Net Force, though I may try them eventually). I'll likely skip the two I've already read most recently though.
For this post, I consumed the following stories:
I read the James Bond novel on the Kobo app and both Tom Clancy novels on Libby, the Overdrive-powered app used by my library for ebooks.
In Casino Royale, an accountant for various communist organizations in Europe named Le Chiffre has lost money in unlucky investments. To get it back, lest he be killed by SMERSH (a fictionalized Soviet organization that kills enemy spies and defectors), he goes to the casino at Royale-les-Eaux, France to win it playing baccarat. British secret agent James Bond (007) is given money to win the money instead, thus bankrupting the communist organizations in question.
Red Storm Rising is the story of a fictional war between the Soviet Union and NATO in the late 1980s. A terrorist attack cripples much of Russia's oil refining capabilities, and so a plan is hatched to disrupt NATO politically, so that the US would not intervene in a Soviet invasion of the Middle-East. The Soviets fake a West German assassination attempt of their government and declare war, invade West Germany and also Iceland to break NATO submarine detection networks, and disrupt shipments of war material from the US. However, the American and NATO forces manage to resist the Soviets and end the war.
SSN is the story of the USS Cheyenne, a Los Angeles-class nuclear attack submarine, in a fictional war between a United Nations coalition (led by the United States) and China following a coup and an invasion of a disputed island group.
Next time I take a break, I'll read some more Tom Clancy and more James Bond books. I'll split them out into different posts though. I originally thought that I could combine them because they both focus on political intrigue, intelligence, spies, war, etc., but the three stories are separated by over 40 years and are very different from each other. The Bond book read fairly quickly, so I can do a handful in a post next time. Subsequent Clancy books will read better together because they are part of a shared universe.
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I've enjoyed James Bond movies since I was a child. My parents took me to see the Pierce Brosnan movies in theatres, and we would watch the Roger Moore and Timothy Dalton ones on TV whenever they would come on. I didn't understand much about the world of spies then, but as an adult I've come to know a bit more about the time period, as well as the tropes of such stories.
I first read Tom Clancy novels in high school, starting with Rainbow Six, because I had begun playing the video game of the same name. As a young man I read a few of his other works, but badly out of order. A few years ago, I tried again reading them in a row, and did his first two Jack Ryan-focussed stories (The Hunt for Red October and Patriot Games), but got distracted by other books and never went back to it.
I'd like to try reading all of the old Ian Fleming Bond novels, as well as a handful of other more recent stories (the current comics, and a Jeffrey Deaver novel from a few years ago). I'd also like to try reading all of Tom Clancy's body of work, with the exception of the series he co-created but did not write (like Op-Center and Net Force, though I may try them eventually). I'll likely skip the two I've already read most recently though.
For this post, I consumed the following stories:
- Casino Royale (novel by Ian Fleming, 1953)
- Red Storm Rising (novel by Tom Clancy, 1986)
- SSN (novel by Tom Clancy, 1996)
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| Cover of Casino Royale by Ian Fleming. Image from Wikipedia. |
Story:
Casino Royale is the first James Bond novel Ian Fleming wrote. The two Tom Clancy novels I chose were the two that were not part of the Ryanverse (the shared universe featuring his lead character Jack Ryan) nor any other series he later developed.In Casino Royale, an accountant for various communist organizations in Europe named Le Chiffre has lost money in unlucky investments. To get it back, lest he be killed by SMERSH (a fictionalized Soviet organization that kills enemy spies and defectors), he goes to the casino at Royale-les-Eaux, France to win it playing baccarat. British secret agent James Bond (007) is given money to win the money instead, thus bankrupting the communist organizations in question.
Red Storm Rising is the story of a fictional war between the Soviet Union and NATO in the late 1980s. A terrorist attack cripples much of Russia's oil refining capabilities, and so a plan is hatched to disrupt NATO politically, so that the US would not intervene in a Soviet invasion of the Middle-East. The Soviets fake a West German assassination attempt of their government and declare war, invade West Germany and also Iceland to break NATO submarine detection networks, and disrupt shipments of war material from the US. However, the American and NATO forces manage to resist the Soviets and end the war.
SSN is the story of the USS Cheyenne, a Los Angeles-class nuclear attack submarine, in a fictional war between a United Nations coalition (led by the United States) and China following a coup and an invasion of a disputed island group.
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| Cover of SSN by Tom Clancy. Image from Wikipedia. |
Thoughts:
I had not realized quite how old Casino Royale was. I know the earliest James Bond movies were made and set in the 1960s, but James Bond's saga opens a mere eight years after the end of World War II. Bond is a veteran but also quite young. I don't know much about the Cold War during that time period, but the world was still recovering from the last war and I understand it wanted to do everything possible to avoid the next one. It's an interesting time period to explore.
The general idea of bankrupting an enemy by beating him in a casino game is a fun one. Obviously it depends on the villain deciding to go to a casino to win money for his or her organization, but it's satisfying to think that our hero can apply his gaming skills to help reduce the threat of communism in the Western world. Plus, as a result of reading Casino Royale, I now know how to play Chemin de fer Baccarat!
James Bond is a deeply unlikable person by modern standards. He is very misogynstic, thinking that women are good for little except personal pleasure. That the early movies had to tone that down to him being a womanizer is telling. He's also described in a way that makes me think he's a heartless bastard. Quite a different depiction that the lovable rogue we see in Roger Moore or Pierce Brosnan movies, but not so far off from the Daniel Craig ones.
Speaking of Daniel Craig, I decided to re-watch the 2006 movie adaptation as I was finishing the book, and I was impressed with the way the story was adapted. In the movie, Le Chiffre is an accountant for terrorists instead of communist unions (that would, in the event of war, act as a military force in foreign countries). We see the failed investment that led him to the casino, instead of being told it in a briefing, and that investment was shorting airline stocks before a terrorist attack (very appropriate post-9/11) instead of buying brothels shortly before the local government banned prostitution. Finally, the game they played in the casino was Texas Hold 'Em poker, a game well understood by most contemporary audiences, instead of chemin de fer baccarat, which the book explains in great detail, but with which I was otherwise unfamiliar. The torture sequence was taken from the book and barely adapted at all. All changes modernized the story without compromising the basic plot: villain loses villainous organizations' money, competes in casino games to win money back, defeat at the hands of James Bond, twist involving the girlfriend.
The movie also introduced Daniel Craig as Bond and the villainous Le Chiffre was played by Mads Mikkelson. Craig is a great Bond, whose harder demeanor is quite similar to his depiction in the books and Mikkelson is just generally fantastic in everything he does.
*
Red Storm Rising was an interesting "what-if" scenario, told as a compelling novel. I don't think the general public gave much thought to how a conventional war between NATO and the Warsaw Pact would go, because the assumption was that it would lead to an exchange of nuclear weapons, which nobody wanted. This book begins with a trigger event that gives a compelling reason as to why the Soviets would want to wage war against Western Europe, and then gives what seems to me to be a realistic plan of action and execution. The war is shown from the perspective of infantry, navies (submarines and surface ships), air forces (including antisatellite operations), and intelligence analysts.
The characters are all quite compelling and realistic, and don't feel like superheroes or total experts. Some are very well trained and ended up perfectly placed, while others are in the wrong place at the wrong time. Most of our focus characters are on the NATO side. Toland, the naval reservist cum intelligence analyst who uncovered the Soviet plot. Morris, the ship captain who suffers PTSD for having lost his ship. McCafferty, the submarine captain with bad luck on several missions in a row. Edwards, the Air Force meteorologist who survives the invasion of Iceland and relays information back to NATO. Nakamura, the awesome lady fighter pilot who shoots down satellites. We do get some Soviet characters too, like Alekseyev, the general at the front lines, and Sergetov, the Minister of Energy on the ruling council.
Something that caught my attention was the detail into which the author goes about weapons. Clancy is obviously a military expert, and the detail he provides is extreme. I'm intrigued by the use of cluster munitions in the fictional conflict, as these weapons have been prohibited (though only for member states of the Convention on Cluster Munitions) since 2010. I know this book (as all works are) is a product of its time, but I would have appreciated a mention of the reasons why it might not be a good idea to use indiscriminate weapons in an area that will, after the war, be repopulated with civilians. They did mention why they wouldn't use chemical weapons (outlawed in 1997), but even that choice was based on a fear of retaliation.
The book ended rather sharply. NATO forces realize why the war was started in the first place, the Soviets who want to prosecute the war at all costs are removed from power, and peace is suddenly declared. I would have preferred a longer final chapter depicting some medium-term consequences of the war. Has the collapse of the Soviet Union moved forward in time? Is the new leadership more open to long-term peace? And what of the displaced civilians? I'm wondering if there was a planned sequel that never developed. At any rate, the abrupt ending left me wanting a more finished story.
*
Regarding SSN, first of all I'm intrigued by the fact that this story first appeared as a video game, and then was adapted into the novel. Normally, stories are first published as books and then adapted into other media (movies, games, etc.) Seeing the reverse is fascinating. Clancy distilled the in-game scenarios into a proper narrative, one that does not incorporate player choice but instead an optimal path (or the best path for the story). I remember thinking about doing this when I was younger, adapting my favourite video game stories into fan fiction. I tried watching some Let's Play videos about the game, but all I've learned is that submarine warfare video games are not something I enjoy.
I found the way SSN was written very interesting. The only named character was the submarine's commanding officer, Captain Bartholomew "Mack" Mackey, who in principle represents the player in the game. No other officers were named; they were only referred to by their roles, as in the game. The book reads as a series of individual adventures of one ship, in the context of a larger conflict. As a result, there isn't much in the way of plot (the overarching story of the war is not presented in detail, only through the lens of the one ship's missions), but it's quite realistic from the Captain's point of view. The downside is that because this is the player character of a video game who obviously survives his own game, the USS Cheyenne gets through the story with barely a scratch and Captain Mackey is treated as a hero. It's perhaps not realistic for one ship and one captain to get so many kills with barely any damage returned.
I'll now return to reading Star Wars books for the time being, beginning with the Battlefront series in the New Canon.The general idea of bankrupting an enemy by beating him in a casino game is a fun one. Obviously it depends on the villain deciding to go to a casino to win money for his or her organization, but it's satisfying to think that our hero can apply his gaming skills to help reduce the threat of communism in the Western world. Plus, as a result of reading Casino Royale, I now know how to play Chemin de fer Baccarat!
James Bond is a deeply unlikable person by modern standards. He is very misogynstic, thinking that women are good for little except personal pleasure. That the early movies had to tone that down to him being a womanizer is telling. He's also described in a way that makes me think he's a heartless bastard. Quite a different depiction that the lovable rogue we see in Roger Moore or Pierce Brosnan movies, but not so far off from the Daniel Craig ones.
Speaking of Daniel Craig, I decided to re-watch the 2006 movie adaptation as I was finishing the book, and I was impressed with the way the story was adapted. In the movie, Le Chiffre is an accountant for terrorists instead of communist unions (that would, in the event of war, act as a military force in foreign countries). We see the failed investment that led him to the casino, instead of being told it in a briefing, and that investment was shorting airline stocks before a terrorist attack (very appropriate post-9/11) instead of buying brothels shortly before the local government banned prostitution. Finally, the game they played in the casino was Texas Hold 'Em poker, a game well understood by most contemporary audiences, instead of chemin de fer baccarat, which the book explains in great detail, but with which I was otherwise unfamiliar. The torture sequence was taken from the book and barely adapted at all. All changes modernized the story without compromising the basic plot: villain loses villainous organizations' money, competes in casino games to win money back, defeat at the hands of James Bond, twist involving the girlfriend.
The movie also introduced Daniel Craig as Bond and the villainous Le Chiffre was played by Mads Mikkelson. Craig is a great Bond, whose harder demeanor is quite similar to his depiction in the books and Mikkelson is just generally fantastic in everything he does.
 |
| Movie poster for 2006's Casino Royale. Image from Wikipedia. |
Red Storm Rising was an interesting "what-if" scenario, told as a compelling novel. I don't think the general public gave much thought to how a conventional war between NATO and the Warsaw Pact would go, because the assumption was that it would lead to an exchange of nuclear weapons, which nobody wanted. This book begins with a trigger event that gives a compelling reason as to why the Soviets would want to wage war against Western Europe, and then gives what seems to me to be a realistic plan of action and execution. The war is shown from the perspective of infantry, navies (submarines and surface ships), air forces (including antisatellite operations), and intelligence analysts.
The characters are all quite compelling and realistic, and don't feel like superheroes or total experts. Some are very well trained and ended up perfectly placed, while others are in the wrong place at the wrong time. Most of our focus characters are on the NATO side. Toland, the naval reservist cum intelligence analyst who uncovered the Soviet plot. Morris, the ship captain who suffers PTSD for having lost his ship. McCafferty, the submarine captain with bad luck on several missions in a row. Edwards, the Air Force meteorologist who survives the invasion of Iceland and relays information back to NATO. Nakamura, the awesome lady fighter pilot who shoots down satellites. We do get some Soviet characters too, like Alekseyev, the general at the front lines, and Sergetov, the Minister of Energy on the ruling council.
 |
| Cover of Red Storm Rising by Tom Clancy. Image from Wikipedia. |
The book ended rather sharply. NATO forces realize why the war was started in the first place, the Soviets who want to prosecute the war at all costs are removed from power, and peace is suddenly declared. I would have preferred a longer final chapter depicting some medium-term consequences of the war. Has the collapse of the Soviet Union moved forward in time? Is the new leadership more open to long-term peace? And what of the displaced civilians? I'm wondering if there was a planned sequel that never developed. At any rate, the abrupt ending left me wanting a more finished story.
*
Regarding SSN, first of all I'm intrigued by the fact that this story first appeared as a video game, and then was adapted into the novel. Normally, stories are first published as books and then adapted into other media (movies, games, etc.) Seeing the reverse is fascinating. Clancy distilled the in-game scenarios into a proper narrative, one that does not incorporate player choice but instead an optimal path (or the best path for the story). I remember thinking about doing this when I was younger, adapting my favourite video game stories into fan fiction. I tried watching some Let's Play videos about the game, but all I've learned is that submarine warfare video games are not something I enjoy.
 |
| Box art for Tom Clancy's SSN, released for the PC in 1996. Image from Wikipedia. |
Next:
Next time I take a break, I'll read some more Tom Clancy and more James Bond books. I'll split them out into different posts though. I originally thought that I could combine them because they both focus on political intrigue, intelligence, spies, war, etc., but the three stories are separated by over 40 years and are very different from each other. The Bond book read fairly quickly, so I can do a handful in a post next time. Subsequent Clancy books will read better together because they are part of a shared universe.
Follow @C_Andrew_H
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